Fears pupils may miss GCSEs over major road closure

There are only three routes for traffic to go in and out of Portsmouth

The closure of a major city road has sparked concerns some pupils will arrive late for their school exams.

Eastern Road in Portsmouth, Hampshire, was partially closed on Sunday so Southern Water can carry out sewer repair works.

The work is expected to take about four weeks, but one councillor said it was causing traffic "gridlock" and could impact students trying to get to their GCSE exams.

But the city council's leader said a note had been sent to schools reminding pupils to leave extra time for their journeys.

The repairs were brought forward after the pipe burst again and flooded the road in March

Costing almost £900,000, the work involves re-lining more than 600m (1969ft) of underground sewer pipe located under the path and verge.

A southbound lane on Eastern Road has been closed, according to the water company.

It follows months of flooding issues on the road due to burst sewers and subsequent flooding.

But Simon Bosher, Conservative group leader, said concerns had been raised in relation to school exams, particularly in the north of the city.

Speaking at Portsmouth City Council's annual meeting on Tuesday, he said: “We are in GCSE season and certainly coming down this morning as I did about that sort of time, Eastern Road was gridlocked, the M275 was gridlocked.

Leader of the council Steve Pitt said the local authority’s education team had included a note about the Eastern Road works in last week’s weekly bulletin, which was sent to all schools.

“They specifically said to remind anyone who was doing any exams that they needed to leave significant additional time in order to be able to reach their destination in a timely manner,” Mr Pitt said.

A Southern Water spokesperson said the third phase of the sewer improvement project had been brought forward to include fixing the burst sewer in Eastern Road as quickly as possible.